In the spring 2014, on my first Semester, a very enthusiastic teacher tried to get a group of students to go on a school trip to Amsterdam. I personally had my doubts about the trip; could I raise the money? Could it have any bad influence on my grade for second semester? I didn’t know the other guys; would we be able to get along? After thinking about it and talking pros and cons for it with my friends, I decided to do it. I mean – you are only a student for a short period of your lifetime, why not make the most of it while you can?

And that decision was probably the best I have made so far in my time at the Business Academy. On the November 22 we were leaving Aarhus. Five people – three from Denmark, one from England and one from Bulgaria, and I didn’t know any of them, but it only took one and a half day, then I felt safe and comfortable around them.

If I should tell very short what that the point of our trip was, it was to attend some marketing classes at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam, and in extension of that starting our exam project 2.2. The Dutch students in the Marketing classes were already working with a client; a polish fashion designer, and we should attend their project with our multi- and social media expertise. We decided to make the designer the client in our project too, which gave us the opportunity to continue the work we did with the Dutch students and translate it into our own project.

We rented a little apartment in the area de pijp, which is an artistic, young, cozy and living area of Amsterdam. In this apartment we lived and worked together in the two weeks the trip lasted. I think a lot of our success with the project process has to be subscribed to our decision about living close together while being down there. We had the opportunity to work at any time of the day that suited us, and we got a natural feeling of how we each worked the online casino best and we got a great workflow.

The trip to Amsterdam was not only “studying”, even though I must admit that it was a huge priority for us. But we also spend hours walking around and enjoying the beautiful and many faced city Amsterdam really is. We shared wine to dinner, and drank beer together in the apartment. We went out dancing, tasted great food and went shopping on street markets, and we walked around in the marihuana smell the inner city sometimes contains. And even though this wasn’t nearly as huge a part of the trip than the study-parts, it is still something that we did together, which made the cooperation between us even better because we got closer experience these things together. As one of the guys asked me after only six days in Amsterdam: “Cæcilie, had you ever thought we could get this close one week ago?” – And actually no, I never thought that I would meet such wonderful persons on this trip.

After we got home from Amsterdam, we still had a week and a half to finish our project, and I must say that this was the most beneficial and cozy study group I have ever been in. Professional wise I got a lot out of this project, because I was forced together with new people for two weeks, with no other opportunity than making it work. And personal wise because I pushed myself out on unsafe ground, and found out that I am a much stronger and out-going person than I actually thought.

Of cause you have to make up your mind about whether you could benefit from a trip like this. My advice for you would be to make certain why you are in doubts about the trip, and then make up your mind if it might benefit you to come out of whatever comfort zone you may be in. Because I had all my doubts about the trip, but right now I’m entering my third semester with a confidence I didn’t have three months ago, both professional but most important personal. And even if we got a bad grade (luckily we didn’t), and even if I used twice the amount of money I would have spent at home, I think it was all worth it.